Open Thread: Improving RAB

No cheesy, throw away open thread topic tonight. Sorry. Instead, we want to ask you for suggestions on how to improve the whole RAB experience.

We already have a ton of ideas ranging from mundane to major overhaul that we’re going to pursue this winter, but we feel it’s important that you guys, the readers, have some input. Do you want to see more statistical analysis? What about less? More long features, or more short blurbs? What about the game threads, any ideas for improving the flow of those guys? Paginated comments perhaps? What about comment registration? Whatever you think can be done to make this place better than it already is, let us know. We’ll review and consider everything.

Leave any suggestions in the comments, otherwise use this as your open thread for the night. The Sunday night game is a good one – the Patriots at the Colts. Go Peyton. Talk about whatever you like, just make sure you follow the guidelines and be cool.

I also agree. If there’s registration it should be voluntary (people can register or comment as non-registered commenters). I assume registration would discourage new people from commenting, and I don’t think the troll problem is big enough that the RABbis should have to do anything that would discourage new readers from commenting.

Edwantsacracker

I think that the thing that really discourages new readers from commenting is the amount of inside jokes on the blog. Sometimes I just have no idea what you guys are talking about.

fox

yes one must lurk a lot before commenting here and not feeling like an idiot but that’s like everything else in life (new city, new school, new clique)

Well the benefit is that the page loads much faster when it’s not loading 300 comments, right? And I assume then the RABbis wouldn’t have to post multiple game threads? I think I’m ok with that idea, it seems like something that’ll improve usability for the authors and readers/commenters alike.

joshweis

That’s true, though I would make sure that if there are, say 125 comments, the first page shows the most recent 100. A certain other blog cuts off at 50 and if there are 51 comments the first page has 1.

toad

I haven’t noticed that as a problem, though maybe others have.

If pagination does eliminate the need for multiple game threads then I would see that as a nice benefit.

Ed

I’d be for that, as long as it doesn’t break comment nesting.

Firefox usually has trouble rendering comment pages when they get too big. The last couple dozen comments on game threads usually aren’t readable.

Ed

Speaking of which, this page is now past that point. I guess it’s around 200 comments where the issues start.

claybeez

I echo the sentiment in favor if it will eliminate the need for multiple game threads.

What i really liked were those podcasts from last year, any chance of you guys doing those again?

Tommy

+1… especially in the dog days of winter when there’s nothing baseball going on.

TheLastClown

+ 2842

pat

More liberal use of the banhammer. Repeat offenders should be banished for months and months at a time. Too much bandwidth is wasted arguing with the same 4 or 5 people who only come to cause trouble.

fox

no. doubt.

http://theyankeeuniverse.com Moshe Mandel

An off-topic thread that is always available, for non-Yankee topics. Gives us a place to just talk baseball before 7pm.

Salty Buggah

+1 to this

Doug

even for yankee topics, but ones that don’t have their own thread yet

http://theyankeeuniverse.com Moshe Mandel

Nah, the writers want Yankee discussions in their posts to keep it centralized to one place. If I post at 10 about something that they will be posting about at 12, it fractures the conversation. Off-topic should be for things that would not be getting their own post.

I didn’t notice that. Oh well, good game. I don’t mean to sound like a douche, but what’s the prize for winning the league?

http://theyankeeuniverse.com Moshe Mandel

And that right there is why I don’t play fantasy sports. As a Packers fan, I had Moss back when he was a Viking, was conflicted, and quit it right there.

Salty Buggah

I want comment registration but then again I dont. Also, I think you guys MIGHT lose some commenters. I know I will register for sure but I know that some probably wont spend the time to do so (I say this because I dont register on some sites because Im too lazy)

Will

That’s a good point, although I’d definitely still register. I don’t register for sites that I browse casually, but I visit RAB multiple times a day, and even when I don’t participate in the commenting, I’d still register for when I do chime in.

Like right now.

Salty Buggah

Exactly, us regulars wouldnt mind but RAB would lose some comments on its articles. Is that a good thing? Perhaps but I think the site will have more traffic when people can comment without having to register. For us its pretty good but Im not sure it will be that good RAB

As far as content, this is one my favorite blogs to check out every day. I wouldn’t change a thing there.

As far as the comment section I would love to see the following:

1) Registration
2) User Profile Maybe? Potentially with a Profile Pic that displays.
3) Ability to hit something like a “Thumbs Up”, and “Thumbs Down” button on someones post and keep track of how many people agree with a comment.

Just a few ideas. I am well aware of the difficulty involved in upgrading a site with those capabilities.

Thanks!

Salty Buggah

“User Profile Maybe? Potentially with a Profile Pic that displays.”

That wouldnt be bad but it would slow down the page loading, especially in Game threads so I’ll say no.

http://www.progressamericana.com/ Pablo Zevallos

A pic that goes only when you click on the username, as opposed to be displayed every time you comment, might also work.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

I think he means it would be something separate. I’d click your name and it would bring me to said profile.

I like it too. But Im guessing that feature would be turned off during game threads so it doesnt slow the site down. But I like that idea.

andrew

agreed. then it would limit the +1’s and +27’s on every post

Salty Buggah

The +27’s are gone already. It’s +28 now!

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

+1!!!

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

True. But those are fun.

andrew

Yes they are. And i’ve done it before, so i know how fun it is, but wouldn’t it be easier to just see 7 thumbs up and 2 thumbs down as opposed to having to read each person say “seconded,” “this,” “+1,” or “cosign”?

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

Yes, lol.

Salty Buggah

Someone to write research papers :)

(but thats just me)

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

I could maybe help with that.

Salty Buggah

Heh, I was just kidding though. I dont know why the :) didnt show

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

It’s up there.

Salty Buggah

Ok, now it just showed up. WTF is going on?

Doug

most difficult thing for me is keeping track of the most recent comments, especially in a game thread.

not sure the best way to improve this, though.

Will

Could you make the site compatible with mobile phones? Like iPhones and Blackberries? I know that’s a complicated process but it would make sitting in class so much easier.

T-Dubs

Sort of a little thing along these lines but I can’t read or participate in the chats on my blackberry and can’t access the site on my work comp. The chats are a favorite of mine so increased compatibility would be fantastic.

joshweis

Agreed – I read RAB mostly on my blackberry and can never add a comment, can only read them.

JGS

you guys run a tight enough ship that you don’t need comment registration.

I think that would discourage potential new posters more than it encourages trolls. SB nation has comment registration and awful trolling problems

I’m always welcome to more Q&A’s and more posts about the farm system (though RAB certainly has plenty, which I love).

John K.

I’d love it if links automatically opened in new tabs.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

Yes.

Crushin Russian

agree

http://www.progressamericana.com/ Pablo Zevallos

+1

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Huge plus one.

Tom Zig

oh hell yes

Count Zero

Agreed.

whozat

Then set your browser up to do that…

John K.

If there’s a way to do it in Firefox I must’ve missed it. As it stands, several other websites do it without me having to adjust the browser.

whozat

just because you want it that way doesn’t mean that everyone does, is more my point.

SF Yanks

Try hitting ctrl + left click which bring the page up in a new tab. I hated this part too, but this work-around works for me. Give it a shot. I actually went so far as to NOT click on links because of that problem but now I’m click happy.

Oh, and I’m using Chrome now while I used to use Firefox, but I can’t remember if it worked in Firefox although I’m guessing it does.

John K.

Good call. Works for Firefox.

fox

god yes, on the money

JMK aka The Overshare

I really like Moshe’s idea of having an open thread at all times of the day. The thing is, I don’t think it would work if it were buried as new posts are put up. Maybe you can put it on the side or figure out a way to make it easily accessible and noticeable.

I also like the idea Mac thought up of having a user profile and maybe our own pages (though that might be way more work than it’s worth) on the site!

Re: Comment registration. On the one hand, it’s possible you’ll lose some commenters. I’m sure one of the goals here is to gain traffic. But another, and I think the most critical, is that you have a community of insightful, thoughtful commenters. You have that now, but it may also weed out some of the LoHudites from their dumb venting and act as a bit of quality control. Sometimes threads get consumed by people wasting their time with unnecessary BS. I see both sides, though.

The posts you guys put up are great. Excellent blend of statistical analysis, insight and suspicion. I would, as another commenter noted, prefer more traditional scouting. Also, a bigger emphasis on prospects, the draft and IFA would be great.

All in all, this is a wonderful site, you guys do a great job and probably don’t get the credit you deserve.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

At TYU (Moshe’s site) I believe they have the “perpetual off-topic post” as a link at the top of the home page.

“… it may also weed out some of the LoHudites from their dumb venting and act as a bit of quality control.”

You know, I totally hear your concern and I used to worry about the LoHudites coming over and changing the comments-sections here at RAB, but, in the end, it’s a) unstoppable and b) not necessarily such a big deal. Look… If the posts and comments here are interesting, people won’t stop coming here, nor should they, and with that comes the fact that some, or even a lot, of the people who come may be less than optimally desirable to a lot of us, but I think over time if the level of discourse is held to a high standard the bad commenters kind of fall by the wayside anyway. And some of them don’t, which can be annoying, but whatever… I don’t think requiring commenter registration is really going to accomplish the intended goal, and it’ll probably cut down on new readers/commenters, which isn’t a good thing. There have been influxes of LoHudites around here before and the site has continued to improve, you just have to deal with them.

The RABbis, and the commenters, are the quality control. There’s no stopping the LoHudites, it’s just a fact of RAB life.

http://www.riveraveblues.com Mike Axisa

What we’re thinking of doing is optional registration. You don’t have to register to comment, but if you do you’ll get access to some special features, like the “show unread comments” feature, or the ability to “like/dislike” comments, or avatars, etc.

Thoughts?

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I like it.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

I like it.

Charlie

maybe. i don’t think i’d go for required registration, but this seems like a decent idea. can you explain what you mean by unread comments feature though?

cool, i really like the thumbs up/down idea and avatars would also be really cool. where would the avatars go? next to our names?

JGS

avatars wouldn’t slow down the load time too much? other than that, sounds good

Mac

Yes!

Jose

I like the optional registration idea. The “like/dislike” idea scares me somewhat. This can create a mob mentality. Unpopular ideas that are expressed coherently are often times voted down. You’re kidding yourself if you don’t think that would happen.

Crushin Russian

/Thumbs down

andrew

It happens already, but instead of thumbs up/thumbs down, people call the commenter a troll, dumb or something else. I think the thumbs up/thumbs down will limit the amount of time people spend berating comments they don’t agree with, which i personally find to be one of the few disappointing parts of RAB

Yeah I’m with andrew on this one… It couldn’t hurt, it’s not like this new feature is going to cause more people to gang up on a commenter and berate him/her, so it could only either do nothing or help the situation by giving people a way to be mean without posting a zillion comments about how stupid someone is. I think it’s worth a shot.

Whether or not we can click a button that says like/dislike would basically be cosmetic. I mean, most make it well known when we disagree with someone anyway. Having a little thumb in the corner wouldn’t make much of a difference.

Jose

If it is just cosmetic why have it at all? Usually websites that have voting make it so when a comments dips low enough it disappears. Other times you can set a level, so you only view comments at that threshold.

Eh, I’d like it. I don’t think it would change much. One thing it might do is get the people that don’t comment often more involved. Rather than typing their disagreement they can just click Yay or Nay.

But so many comments on here are opinion based, recommended only gives you whether or not you think it’s a good post. If you are going to add the recommend option, why not the opposite

Jose

Due to sociological reasons, mob mentality occurs more when voting a comment down. People will band together to bash people more often then banding together to support each other. Only being able to recommend still helps to add a type of quality control to the website, while avoiding the downsides associated with being able to vote a comment down.

andrew

Agreed. But as I said above, the mob mentality already exists on RAB, so i’m not sure how much the “dislike” option would add to it. I’m definitely on board for the “thumbs up” though. I could see why the “thumbs down” may not be the best idea, but again, I happen to think it’s not a big deal.

TheLastClown

I just want to gang up with andrew to support Jose…his points are good and I agree with them.

This copacetic feeling just makes me want to band together in support.

But my support is for an idea that says my feeling should be intentioned differently, yea, opposite! And so I agree with he who is anti-agreeing, making me by default disagree…annnnndddd……..pop!

I like this feature. I also like the related feature that lets you list the comments in order of most-recommended to least-recommended. If you don’t have much time, or are at work, etc., having a way to see the best comments without sifting through an entire thread can be quite helpful.

http://www.progressamericana.com/ Pablo Zevallos

Sounds great to me

Tom Zig

Best of both worlds, I like it. I’m in favor of mandatory comment registration, but then we’d lose most if not all of the trolls and as much as every hates them, you all know you love to argue against them and post funny links.

I like it, this seems like the best option on the commenter-registration front. Best of both worlds.

Matt

I would love an auto-refresh type thing to make it easier to read through game threads? Having to refresh every minute gets kinda annoying.

JMK aka The Overshare

People might seize with how often it would refresh. Also, say you’re typing in a comment and then BOOM! shit refreshes and you lose everything?

Jose

AJAX

http://www.riveraveblues.com Mike Axisa

When we first launched the site, we had a flash app that automatically inserted new comments. The page didn’t refresh, they just appeared in the proper location. The problem was that it completely crippled the site because it took up some much bandwidth and stuff.

Jose

Did you use Flash or AJAX before? AJAX can actually reduce bandwidth usage.

This is a great idea. Check out Blogging the Boys, a dallas cowboys blog. They use this for their game day thread and it works great. link: http://www.bloggingtheboys.com/

Yankeefan91 Arod fan

Live Video Chats would Be very kool.

Charlie

nah, i would stick with the current RAB chats

RZG

I always read the front page articles but often don’t read the comments, especially when there’s more than 100, because a small number of people leaving comments seem to use more messages trying to leave comments I guess they think are witty rather than address the subject. While I can scroll past most of the messages when I see the writer’s name it might be nice to have a squelch feature available. It would require registration though.

Perhaps I’m not aware of a shortcut but it would also be nice to be able to go to the beginning of the next “thread / indentation” of comments rather than needing to scroll through dozens of messages of people just writing the same thing over and over again.

It would have been useful the other day when two people kept responding to each other without changing what they were writing for what seemed like 50 comments.

Thanks to all 3 of you. This was about a month before I started reading RAB. Awesome stuff.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Yes.

daniel aka bryce harper

just taking this opportunity to salute the great work that you guys do day in and day out. Having a reliable source for yankees info that is well-written is an incredibly scarce commodity, and its great to know i can come here instead of having to piece information together. Thanks again.

Salty Buggah

Whatever changes you make, keep the site design like (or similar to) what it is right now. I like how its simple and appealing.

Charlie

if you decide to do the optional (or required) registration, how about some kind of notification for when someone replies or likes your comment

http://deleted daniel aka bryce harper

excellent idea

fox

this dude brought more cowbell, great idea.

Andy in Sunny Daytona

I think you guys should try to do some interviews with some minor league players. Try to get some good personal and baseball info about said players. I would find that immensely entertaining.

Tom Zig

I think you guys should try to do some interviews with some minor leaguewives of the players

JMK aka The Overshare

Paging Jose Tabata…

Salty Buggah

Yea, that would be awesome. Maybe you could be the RAB “beat reporter” since you see a lot games. You provide videos and pics already. And Ganesh would like you even more.

I don’t comment much, but I’m an avid reader of this blog, and it’s awesome already.

More statistical analysis would be nice though. I really liked the pitch/fx chart posts you guys did at the beginning of the year when you analyzed a couple starts. This coupled with some analyzing WPA charts from fangraphs would be nice.

Salty Buggah

Yea, I forgot about those. Mike, you need to do those pitch f/x analysis again. Didnt you lose your excel main file or something? How long does it take to make one again? Those were awesome.

whozat

This was basically going to be my comment. I loved the pitchfx posts, mike.

C

Ditto. The Pitch/FX charts were awesome.

T-Dubs

The frequency of posts is what’s most important to me. I LOVE that I can read usually 3-5 posts during my 9-5 workday.

http://hardballtimes.com/main/blog dan

Fire Mike.

Crushin Russian

?

http://hardballtimes.com/main/blog dan

I’m kidding.

Crushin Russian

more polls at the side of the page…

i.e. What should the yanks focus on this offseason?
-SP
-RP
-OF
-Bench
etc…

JMK aka The Overshare

Since we’re throwing out outlandish ideas, most of which will never come to fruition:

-Stripper videos. But not Staten Island strippers. Most have one breast implant (saving up for the other) with cigarette burns they say are “Cindy Crawford moles”. I’m talking about high-quality strippers donning Yankee gear.
-RAB-based gambling using Paypal.
-Get-togethers (I’ll bring my hair dolls)
-Livechats with Hank Steinbrenner
-Adopt-a-DSL-Yankee program
-Law school homework help from Ben
-An ombudsman. Pete Abe or Axl (Rose) would work!
-RAB commercials using some of our most popular memes

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

IETCVM

Big Rich

IETCVM?

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I enjoyed that comment very much.

Jose

-Ability to submit trade proposals directly to Cashman (ex. Melky and Kennedy for any current major leaguer)
-Online order form for my own 2009 World Champion ring
-Screw stripper videos, we need actual strippers that we can order online
-Steak and blowjob thursdays

Mobile Site would be awesome, I am always on RAB on my iPhone, ever since Lo Hud got mobilized its been nice.

Also, I love articles on speculation and appreciation threads. I want to know more about the players than just their BA,HR, etc…

Also lets get more videos going, everything is visual now…chats and other stuff.

but this is my favorite yankee blog to check on, so keep up the good work

whozat

THey had a mobile site, and basically deprecated it in favor of RSS feeds. I use Google reader, and subscribe to the RAB RSS feed, and that’s GREAT for reading the posts.

It’s very true that the JS-heavy commenting software does not play well with my phone. It’s agonizingly slow.

I think that, if the auto-preview feature was turned off for mobile browsers, that’d speed it up enough that the site would work well as-is.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

What about a weekly 3 up 3 down type thing for prospects? It could be a side bar with the player name and like their stats for the week and/or a whole post.

Crushin Russian

awesome idea it could also work with the major leaguers

JMK aka The Overshare

That is a cool idea.

andrew

I like that

vin

very cool

fox

sick!

OldYanksFan

I’m a regular at Bronx Banter. Great writing and great site. They have pagenation and it sucks. Makes for many annoying extra clicks.

Registration ALWAYS makes a site better. Make sure to have a ‘Remember Password’ box and write a long-term cookie, so people only have to re-signin if they delete their cookies.

DURING HOT STOVE.
Have a specific thread for individual issues, that’s on the side bar and prominant.

Pettitte thread…
JD thread…
Martui thread…
Granderson thread…
etc.

This way we can have a cohesive, targeted discussion of on-going issues.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I like the idea of ongoing threads for pending issues.

http://www.workwithpete.com Pete

Cohesive? Targeted?

Overrated.

Hey, anyone see the last ’30 Rock’…?

;)

Crushin Russian

mobilize the site for iphone and any other phone

JMK aka The Overshare

I have a Zach Morris phone. I can’t even text out apostrophes. I don’t think that would work for “any other phone.”

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

From any other commenter, I’d laugh. But, for some reason, I believe JMK has a Zach Morris phone.

JMK aka The Overshare

Shit doesn’t have a SIM card. F’real. It’s like six years old and has no T9 function. Oh, and if your name starts with a W, X,Y or Z, I can’t add you to my contacts. Not sure why.

Jose

What cellphone company you got?

JMK aka The Overshare

Verizon. I can get a free upgrade or spend like $100 on one of those newfangled Blackberry phones, but I sort of like the novelty of the POS I have now. It’s like that old, sick, smelly dog you have that lives way too long, and even though you never really liked the dog, you just can’t put it down.

Jose

I fell in love with my Motorola Droid.

JMK aka The Overshare

Never heard of it but I love the name. It sounds like an Enemy of the State phone.

Ed

SIM cards are only in GSM phones. In the US, AT&T and T-Mobile are GSM, and just about everyone else is CDMA. Outside the US, it’s almost exclusively GSM.

JMK aka The Overshare

Hmmm…this looks like it’s written in English, but I still don’t understand it. Acronyms everywhere!!!!!

Ed

You get a phone from AT&T or T-Mobile, it has a SIM card. You get one from Verizon or someone else, it doesn’t. Buy a phone in another country, it has a SIM card. Doesn’t matter if your phone is cheap or expensive.

On topic: I’d sign up and register – but that’s not a panacea. Your determined trolls can and will create bogus accounts, use proxy servers, and such. I’ve seen this on a few message boards I’ve been involved with.

Best is to ignore trolls completely – they shrivel up like a salted slug

Content?
-I like the all-purpose non-baseball thread.
– Wonder if Chad Jennings, Mark Feinsand, et al, would come by for the occasional chat.
– Might want to get the new Scranton-WB Yankees beat writer over once a week for a specific down-on-the-farm segment. Same with the hard-working Mike Ashmore.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

She’s my dad’s favorite part of the broadcast. Every Sunday night he basically tunes in to watch her sing, tells us how good looking she is, then turns the channel haha.

leche: it does the yankees good

how about box scores in the game recaps

Andrew

more tna

Crushin Russian

total nonstop action?
or
the dirtier one?

Steven

Overall, the site is just awesome and I think just adding maybe a little more with stats to post games, and maybe more counters on the side of the page like the brackman watch thing, but besides that, I don’t see many flaws

Scott

Why rebuild the wheel RE comments? RAB is an excellent community with some very knowledgeable people. Why not have a message board that automatically indexes your posts for commenting (macrumors.com comes to mind)? It’s hard to follow posts here come game time and a threaded message board like vbulletin would really improve that. It would also allow user profiles, avatars, user registration with a page to show unread comments and even a daily open thread as were suggested previously. I really believe some of the most knowledgeable fans in all of baseball post on this site – my suggestion would be to foster that and build the community even more.

Free Mike Vick

a little less sabermetrics and a little more BAVG, HRs and RBI talk.

ooops…did i just upset the RAB nerds??

::SARCASTIC AND JOKING POST ALERT FROM FMV::

Jose

You have upset me and my spreadsheet. Now if you will excuse me, my mother is calling me up for dinner.

JMK aka The Overshare

I call it a “Garden Apartment,” thank you very much.

http://www.workwithpete.com Pete

BFOG, baby.

http://theenlighteneddespot.com NC Saint

Another vote for comment registration. It’s wonderful that you guys are doing so well, but there is definitely an upper limit on how much traffic you can have before meaningful discussion in the comments is impossible. You’re getting close. Pete Abe’s old site was way over the limit.

Registration helps extend that limit a lot.

More on the minors, more in-depth analysis. Less of the day-to-day generic stuff. If you spent half, or even a third as much time on game wraps and coverage of issues that angry sports journalists are worrying about that week, and put that into another prospect report, stat analysis, or whatever, that would be phenomenal.

Please never, ever type the word ‘steroids’ again.

Keep up the great work!

http://www.progressamericana.com/ Pablo Zevallos

+1 on everything except that last point (I personally find it important to know what happened way back when, but that’s for another day)

chriskeo

Hey guys, thanks for doing a great job all season long. Part of the season I love this site is for posts with comments like these, I know at least one of you guys will read through all these comments and listen to your readers. You guys care about our input, I think that’s really cool.

Andrew S.

Anything that you find on mainstream sports news is great. Looking at things from a TOTALLY different angle than is usually presented means an overall better reading experience, and one that is more attention grabbing.

How that is to be achieved is really just thinking outside the box (which I think is done a lot anyway), but I think that’s what makes River Ave Blues such a great site.

A.D.

Perhaps RAB can fine tune an actual grit statistic so we can compare a players gritiness amongst each other. The obvious rule is that Eckstein & Casey Blake would have be #1 and 2 for the scale to have any weight.

Otherwise in reality:

I like the growth of the sabermetic stats & looking at some of the release and velocity charts i.e. what was different with Wang. More/continued use of this was great.

While I certainly would register as a user, I would vote against registration (if it were some type of vote).

Love the confidence poll, maybe an expansion to be 3 pronged: management, big league team, farm… in this case could maybe be bumped to bi monthly or monthly.

JMK aka The Overshare

Could you imagine if Eckstein grew our a classy beard like Blake? Off the fucking charts, man!

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Put Blake’s beard and Brendan Ryan’s mustache on Eckstein and there would be too much grit to handle.

I think you guys should branch out into some merchandising. T-shirts, tschochkes, etc. – RAB-related and Yankees-related (you can sell stuff that’s clearly Yankees related without infringing on their intellectual property). If the merch is cool/funny, people will eat it up and it’ll be another way to market the site and bring in new readers, not to mention the money it’ll put in your pockets.

Oh, and anyone who posts comments asking for updates on the RAB Radio Show gets ritually disemboweled. (Kidding, but seriously, people… They’ll tell you when there’s something to tell you.)

Jose

So I’m safe then, I was only asking who listened to it, not if it was going to be updated. *phew*

TheLastClown

About that though, within the last few weeks, I think it was Joe, but it was one of the three of them said that they discontinued it because they thought it had no listeners.

So people articulating their desire to resurrect it should tell them that they’re not just pissing in the wind, as it were.

I wouldn’t want to badger, but I want them to know if they want to do it, I’ll listen.

My dad is at a charity golf event last weekend here in Tampa. He’s wearing a Titleist hat with the Yanks logo on it. His buddy is wearing a Yanks hat and sweatshirt.

So, they as they are waiting to tee off and an African American man sitting in a golf cart yells, “Mr. So and So (forget his buddies name), nice hat!” (niether of them know who he is). So my dad, forever the wise-ass, yells back “Yeah, what team do you like?!?” The man replies, “Anyone who beats NY.” My dad then says “Yeah, good luck with that!”

About 10 minutes later, my dads friend’s son comes up to him and says “Dad, you know who that was?”. His dad puzzled replies, “No I don’t, who is it?”

“Denard Span”

Kinda makes what my dad said a little bit funnier IMO.

JMK aka The Overshare

That’s awesome.

Tommy S

You should design and sell T-Shirts, you would not only make some money but you would also promote the website.

Tommy S

Sorry I didn’t realize that Mondesi has already mentioned the T-Shirt thing. Anyway I think he has a good idea. I thought of it when I looked on the surviving grady website and saw that they were selling a T-Shirt. I thought to myself that I wish the RAB guys would make something like that cause I would buy it.

TheLastClown

Don’t remember “Save The Big Three?”

Stu H

Clean up the comments look; they get messy and hard to track, what’s new, etc. due to order issues and there’s lots of scroll for a tiny amount of genuine content.

More trips to Vegas, but next time with random fans being taken with you.

Stryker

i really would like more statistical analysis. not only on the team’s play, but the team’s actions as a whole (i’ve seen posts on other team-specific blogs about how well the club judges the open market, shrewdness of trades and whatnot). i think you guys here do an excellent job of bringing sabermetrics and this new-ish way of thinking to the site – for a club that is notorious for being stuck in old ways – and i think you could really go for the jugular with this stuff. in addition, i’d like to see the guide to stats updated a bit with stuff like wOBA, BABIP, etc.

i’d also like to see the the confidence poll expanded. i recall the question itself was pretty ambiguous. what if, instead of one unified poll there were others in addition? i know we do one after a weeks-worth of yankees baseball. what if we had one for the current season’s team (based on current events), and one for the future of the franchise? you could have one for girardi as well, but i could see that kind of poll creating a bunch of ledge jumpers after a bad week or so. as far as the format – it’d be similar to that of the regular confidence poll where the week’s actions are objectively bullet-ized and whatnot. as far as the future of the franchise – a run down of the buzz players in the system, the affiliates’ records, any other goings on that would have implications on the future of the organization (money issues, etc).

jim p

Stop picking on Melky and Gardner.

Other than that, it would be nice if there were a “parent” button to click to bring you back in a thread to the comment someone is replying to.

Gardner I can understand but Melky’s been decent this year. He doesn’t deserve some of the hate that we see sometimes.

whozat

It’s not hate, at least not from the authors. It’s healthy skepticism.

Look, I understand that Melky and Cano were basically the first young guys the Yanks developed in a long time, and that it was very exciting. And I remember his first real season, with the very good OBP and the arm gunning guys down…he was so young that it was reasonable to say he might really be good, despite his minor league numbers not being really amazing. However, the fact that he’s mostly run in place, or even regressed, since then…well, saying that people who believe that he’s not much above average are “hating” is kind of overreacting.

Micah

I love your blog – during the season it’s absolutely the first blog I check out on my reader.

I only have one problem with it: the typos. This may seem like a silly gripe, but sometimes it seems like you don’t even re-read your posts once. This is a full-fledged professional blog with thousands of readers. Either proof your posts by yourselves, or hire a copy-editor. Typos cause the posts to read rushed and sloppy. I know the late-night recaps are a pain when you’re exhausted, but editing needs to happen to take this site to the next level.

Anthony

Maybe like profiles where you can see other peoples profiles and their posts. Also please keep the comments on 1 page. when I go to Portugal for 2-3 weeks every year during August I use this website to check up on the Yanks on my ipod touch. I can only get internet for lke 10 seconds at a time when I can find it so only have time to load 1 page

http://thetundrablog.blogspot.com/ Jake H

Here are some suggestions.

1. A RAB dictionairy button.
2. Panel discuss with other Yankee bloggers for things like cy young predictions and such before the season.
3. A guest post once every 2 weeks or so.
4. In the offseason tackle subjects that will affect baseball with a Yankee view point and a baseball view point. Ideas such, world wide draft, hard slotting and labor talks.
5. Monthly question and answers with guys who are covering the minors during the season.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

This has to be the most on-topic open thread ever.

Steve H

Ok, I’ll get you off topic.

When’s Shark Week coming back?

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Not soon enough.

If only they find a way to incorporate Nick Swisher into Shark Week…oh man.

Steve H

I would start to watch it.

And your head would explode.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Most likely.

Joe

I think RAB should put the time that posts go up.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Posted on Sunday, November 15th, 2009 at 7:00 pm in Administrative Stuff, Open Thread.

Jpseph M

This is a great blog, full of interesting topics and lively discussion, I wouldn’t change a thing.

Keeping it optional to attract new commenters though I think is crucial. You guys are pretty much the gold standard on this Yankeeblog ish, so why not be as attractive as possible to newcomers who are sick of ESPN et al.? Grow this brand!!! You’ve got a gigantic nation/worldwide Yankee fanbase to draw from, as of course you know.

When new folks come here, who’ve only heard the MSM “analysis,” it’s a whole new experience. I think you should retool your ‘About’ tab for starters.

“We write about the Yankees” — that doesn’t really do it for me, or for people who are coming wet behind the ears. Something about the alternative approach you guys take, the focus on analysis through sabermetrics, etc.

Then about the sabermetrics. I love all the coverage, but maybe also retool the RAB Statguide. UZR is still ZR in there. No explanations of WAR or wOBA or even FIP. Linking through to FanGraphs etc would probably be fine, but in the interest of having this place be any Yanks fan’s one-stop-shop for all things Pinstriped, maybe give the stats explanations an RAB flair.

Thanks for appealing to us for improvement ideas.

Mazel, RABbis!

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I agree. Expand, update and improve the ‘About’ tab. This is an excellent resource and forum for Yankees fan. Don’t be afraid to sell the site a little more there.

andrew

“we write about the yankees.” so brief. so true.

TheLastClown

Brevity is the soule of wit.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I agree with that too. And actually, this morning, I’m not so sure if I agree with my post.

“We write about the Yankees” is pretty representative of the blog. Straight forward and awesome.

JM

What is with the smiley face at the bottom of each page?

Rebecca from ze ipod

Spillover threads before they become unbearable

joshweis

First of all, you guys are doing a great job – this is in my mind the best Yanks blog out there.

a couple of suggestions:

1) number the comments in the threads (I realize there are often replies that get embedded, but you could name them 1a, 1b, etc)

2) I said this above, but in case it gets lost, I would love to be able to post from a mobile device – my blackberry reads the page well, but I can add comments from it, and my mobile device is where I read the blog 95% of the time.

sean

Just don’t nuts changing the site like NoMaas did–their new page is a mess to deal with

Yeah but if there was a prospect Profile on one of the players you could have that link next to the name. It could work.

whozat

Or, you could just search for the prospect and get all the articles about him.

I’m just saying that I don’t really see a need to give pride-of-place to a page that’s not going to change much over the course of the season. Like…once I read that content, how often do I need to go there again? If I want to find out about Ivan Nova, I’ll just search for him.

Yeah yeah.. lmgtfy.com
You could say the same thing about the depth chart. Just go to Yankees.com and find the depth chart.

I like the idea as it would add to convenience.

You’re right we don’t need a tab like “Top 30 Prospects,” but it would be a link that would get a lot of clicks and it goes together well with a daily DotF.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

I don’t know, I kind of like that idea. But it could be more than just a list. I’m not sure how much effort this would take, but it could be more of a top 30 prospect tracker. There could be updates, current stats and links to any stories about the players.

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

And actually if you were going to do this, I’d rather it be a Top 10 or 15. That would probably make it more manageable.

love permanent open thread idea.
i also think it’d be cool if there were something of a “highlight” function – comments that spurned a great deal of discussion get highlighted, whereas ones that didn’t get left alone. I think the like/dislike function would be good but better if not left anonymous – it could go along with the optional comment registration thing; registering gives you the ability to like/dislike a comment, and if you do it says “so and so likes this/ dislikes this”
I really like the way people here instantly shut down (and ban) commenters who make derogatory comments about race/sex/sexuality/religion, etc. As both a gay man and a rabid sports (especially baseball) fan, it’s nice to have a place like this, that has not only the (arguably) most intelligent yankee-related discussion, but also the highest level of social acceptance of any blog i’ve found. You guys really stand up to people who deserve it, and that really means a lot.

Steve H

Brady>>>>>>>Manning

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Nick Swisher > Both

I also like that as soon as I read this comment, Peyton threw a TD.

Steve H

That’s ok, Brady will get another soon.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

As long as the Giants don’t lose.

Mike Pop

You were saying, Steve H?

pete

that’s like saying jeter>>>>>>a-rod.
i mean yeahh…but no…

Herb

The site is quite excellent as is. I see no need for any bells and whistles. I would encourage the authors, as the site grows, to think more about original content (e.g. scouting reports). RAB could certainly team with people that could offer such material in guest posts. In the same vein, I would love to hear Chad Jennings or someone like that on the RAB radio show.

Finally, I cringe when the authors visit each others’ posts. No offense, but Ben should not comment in the DOTF. It kind of ruins the magic, not to mention compromises the integrity of the site. You would never see that in the Washington Post online comments (or even mlbtr), and there’s a reason for it. If you’re going to cross pollinate/create an echo chamber, then you need to think about an ombudsman to keep the house in order. Let the outside readers carry the discussion with the single author. If you want to do a forum once in a blue moon, then designate it as such. Or limit it to the radio show. If there’s a guest author, then limit to one RAB author in the comments.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Finally, I cringe when the authors visit each others’ posts. No offense, but Ben should not comment in the DOTF. It kind of ruins the magic, not to mention compromises the integrity of the site. You would never see that in the Washington Post online comments (or even mlbtr), and there’s a reason for it. If you’re going to cross pollinate/create an echo chamber, then you need to think about an ombudsman to keep the house in order. Let the outside readers carry the discussion with the single author. If you want to do a forum once in a blue moon, then designate it as such. Or limit it to the radio show. If there’s a guest author, then limit to one RAB author in the comments.

I do not like this suggestion at all. The great thing about this blog is that the authors all put something in to just about everything that goes up. The authors entering the commenting section also allows the readers to interact with them more than most blogs.

Ben, Joe and Mike are knowledgeable Yankee fans. I think a lot of us here like hearing their opinions on a post, regardless of whether or not they are the ones who wrote said post.

pete

i completely disagree. I think the community between authors and commenters is part of what makes RAB special

SF Yanks

100% agree with this and 100% disagree with the original post. I love reading anything from Mike, Ben, Joe and in any article.

whozat

I completely disagree as well. THis isn’t a pro blog. It’s a fan blog. There are zillions of blogs run by reporters; RAB is different because it’s these three dudes who love the Yankees, have day jobs, and just do this because their passion for the Yanks is just off the scale. I love that.

You’re acting like there’s some kind of agenda that they’re trying to push on us, and that having the other two authors show up in the comments is somehow “unfair” to the opposition. That’s kind of ridiculous. They agree about a bunch of stuff because they found each other by reading and liking each other’s stuff at other sites…they don’t agree about everything, and they’re not some kind of propaganda machine.

I think this blog is perfect. I wouldn’t change a think. It is great that you guys are seeking reader input but my response is, if aint broke…you know the rest. Perfect amount of statistical analysis, threads are fine exactly the way they are, same with registration, pagination/comments. It is a fun, sophisticated read and the threads, especially over the past couple of days, are always entertaining.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

Okay so I’m guessing the game ended well? I turned it off to play The Show online; didn’t even make it through five. The mother fucker quit after I hit one out w/Melky to make it 5-1.

http://www.riveraveblues.com Mike Axisa

Nah, nothing major. Just Belichick going for it on 4th and 2 at the two minute warning, not making it, then Peyton going down the field to score the winning touchdown with 13 seconds left.

http://bronxbaseballdaily.com Matt ACTY/BBD

OH snap!

Rockdog

Love the site — def my fav Yankees site and you guys do a lot of great work.

Two things that I would love to see more of:

1. More prospect profiles and info
2. More interviews with anyone in the Yankees organization. I find all of the info throughout the organization to be really interesting

Not sure if others have an interest in the above, but would also say that I love the site and the regulars — great, great stuff!

Mike HC

I love the site as is. You guys should really do whatever the hell makes you guys happy and writing.

The only thing I would not like would be the mandatory registration. The vast majority of people who read this site are Yankee fans. That should really be enough registration right there. I know there are a couple of trouble makers, but it never really gets that bad.

I also think voluntary registration is unnecessary. I like the openness of the site. Every commenter is equal with a clean slate and judged based on their opinion, not based on their approval rating or something.

I don’t know. No matter what changes you guys make, I will still be reading and commenting. The writing and frequency of posts is what makes the site great, so as long as that does not change, everything else is secondary.

adeel

I like everything about the site as it is. The format is great. Have you thought of adding forums to the site? It’s like you have a 10 hour window to post something on an article, and then it’s forgotten in the back pages and noone goes back there. Maybe there could be a link in the sidebar to your more in depth/important articles, so that the discussion can continue to the next day.

Also, having some sort of bulletin board where us fans can arrange meetups at bars (maybe by county) for important games would be nice. It doesn’t have to be an official RAB thing, but if 10 people living in North Jersey wanna catch A friday night Yankees/Redsox matchup at some bar, there really isn’t a place on the net that’s organized JUST for that.

Hey ZZ

I have a suggestion for something you guys should do right now: Send Ken Rosenthal your Hot Stove Rules. Notably, your trade proposal sucks.

“I’ve even got a possible trade in mind — Miguel Cabrera for Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon, third baseman Mike Lowell and a prospect, either first baseman Lars Anderson or right-hander Stolmy Pimentel.”

http://theyankeeway.mlblogs.com/ Keanu Reeves

Yea that was a pretty ridiculous article.

Kelvz

Frequent reader here, but I only post comments sometimes. Regarding the ‘optional’ registration, how about if you are not registered, then there is somewhat a limit to how fast or frequent you can post comments. That way, frequent readers but only seasonal posters don’t need to register, and trolls wouldn’t be trolling that much.

tony

I like the long feautures

steve s

I’d like to see a recurring weekly thread that focuses just on what the Yankee bashers in the media wrote or said during the prior week giving the RAB family a chance to vent at what are often the mindless biased diatribes against the Yanks (Mushnick, Raissman, Lupica and Yahoo’s Passan come to mind along with most of the FAN hosts). I enjoyed the Taibbi thread comments that followed the post of his anti-Cashman/Yankee article. I’m sure there will always be new material to discuss on a weekely basis even in the off-season.

avi

Definitely shorter blurbs The posts are way too long. At least give the “read more” option for those who want to read the entire post.

Besides a game thread for comments, updates with analasys from you guys during the game(ala lohud) would be great. Keep up the good work!

I love the old comment/new comment feature (the little box that’s either gray if you’ve read the comment or an interlocking-NY symbol if it’s a comment you haven’t read), but it would be great if that little box had a word in it, like “new” or something, so we could type that word into a “find” feature and very quickly be able to search through only the new comments. I know the NY symbol looks cool, but we’re be able to find the new comments much quicker if there was a searchable word in that little box. It would make the really long threads much more manageable.

UnNamed Yankee Source

I would like to see something along the lines of Yankee History. Things about the old teams and the stadium they played in. Perhaps divide it up by decade, include pictures of the players, old uniforms, the stadium, perhaps even some fans for a good laugh at what they were wearing!

Another thing I would like to see is a Drafted but did not sign list. Kinda like if we drafted Albert Puljos in the 50th round but he never signed! Or if say Jeter was drafted by the Red Sox and did not sign, choosing to sign with us the next year.

I would also like to see a section about ‘Where are they Now” …like what on earth is Wade Boggs doing these days besides Hair Club commercials!

http://www.vebtek.com NG

Hi.
1. As a blogger with some sort of background I would suggest to add “Rate this post” feature. For the sake of argument let’s assume some kind of 1 to 10 rating system.
Then on the right side of your blog page have something like “Top rated posts” where links to the top rated posts appear. For regulars it gives a chance to go back and read whatever post they liked most and for newcomers it is a chance to take a shortcut to the style of this blog and its readers.
2. Another thing to consider is to add some kind of graph that reflects users location. On the bottom of each post have a graph with different colors to reflect where most visitors come from.

Megatron J

+1

JT

I really would love it if your brought back the Podcasts.

They where very interesting and you guys have tons of baseball knowledge.